As both cloud use and spend increase, enterprises need to implement automated cloud governance. IT leaders must avoid impeding the agility that cloud provides while ensuring efficient cloud spend and reducing risk. In this webinar, we will cover 10 automated policies that every enterprise should have as part of IT governance best practices for cloud.

1. 10 MUST-HAVE
AUTOMATED CLOUD POLICIES
FOR IT GOVERNANCE

2. • Kim Weins
• VP Cloud Strategy & Spend Optimization, Flexera
• Ryan O’Leary
• Senior Director, Product Management, Flexera
Presenters

3. ● Developing a cloud governance process
● How to maintain agility and flexibility of cloud use
● How to automate the remediation of policy violations
● 10 automated policies that should be your top priority
Agenda
2

4. Why Do Policies Need to Be “Multi-Cloud”?
3

5. Top Initiatives: Optimize Cloud, More Cloud
4

6. Few Organizations Are Automating Policies
5

7. A Common Policy Engine
RightScale
Cloud Management Platform
Orchestrate, automate and govern workloads
across all your environments.
VIRTUAL
SERVERS
PUBLIC
CLOUDS
ANY CLOUD
SERVICE
PRIVATE
CLOUDS
BARE METAL
SERVERS
CONTAINER
CLUSTERS
RightScale
Optima
Work collaboratively across the organization
to manage and optimize clouds costs.
RIGHTSCALE
EXTENSIBLE ORCHESTRATION API
Policy-Based Governance
User access controls and policies

8. Maturing Your Management of Cloud
7
Reactive Responsive PreventativeProactive
Fire drill Manual policies and
processes
Automated policies
and processes
Prevent issues
before they occur
Automated Policies

9. Breaking Down a Policy

10. From Alert Only to Fully Automated Resolution
9
Alert only
Alert
Approval
Automated
resolution
Fully
automated
resolution
Move toward full automation as you gain confidence in policy conditions

11. Policies Go Beyond Costs
10
Policies
Define and enforce governance rules
Cost
Unattached volumes
Old snapshots
Unused RIs
Underutilized VMs
...and more
Security
Unsecured storage
Open security groups
Disallowed ports
Open IAM policies
...and more
Compliance
Untagged resources
Invalid tags
Disallowed
configurations
...and more
Operational
No recent snapshots
No DB backup
No required alerts
Upsize instances
...and more

12. Customizing Out-of-the-Box Policies
11
Find untagged
resources
Apply default tags
when possible
Send an email
alert/report
Find untagged
resources
Apply default tags
when possible
Create a JIRA
ticket
Wait 48 hours and
terminate/delete
Out-of-the-Box Policy
“Tag Checker”
Customized Policy
“Delete Untagged”
Update resolution
in JIRA ticket

13. DEMO

14. COST POLICIES

15. Policy: Reserved Instance Alerts
14
RI < 95%
utilized?
Y
Email
Alert/Report
Pass
N
RI Alert Examples:
-Expiration
-Underutilized
-Coverage

16. Policy: Unattached Volumes (UAV)
15
Unattached >
x days?
Y
Email Alert
Pass
Action: Delete
volume
User specified
to delete?
Y
N
Email Alert
N

17. Policy: Downsize Instances
16
< x% avg CPU
and <y% max
mem used
Y
Email Alert
No action
Action:
Downsize
User specified
to downsize?
Y
N
Email Alert
N

18. Policy: Instance Scheduling via Tags
17
After shutdown &
before start time
Action: Stop
instance
Y
After start time &
before shutdown
Action: Start
instance
Y
Tag Syntax Example (M-F 8-5):
instance:schedule=8-17;MO,TU,WE,TH,FR;America/New_York

19. Policy: Leverage Azure Hybrid Benefit
18

20. SECURITY POLICIES

21. Policy: Security Group Anomalies
20
SG Has
Anomalies
Y
Email Alert
Pass
N
SG Anomaly Examples:
-High Open Ports
-ICMP Enabled
-Rules without Descriptions

22. Policy: Open Storage Buckets
21
Public storage
bucket?
Y
Email Alert
Pass
Action: Make
private
Check if
public tag?
N
Y
Pass
Slack Alert
N

23. OPERATIONAL POLICIES

24. Policy: No Recent Volume Snapshots
23
Volume has no
snapshots in last
x days
Y
Email Alert
No action
Action: Take
snapshot
User specified
to downsize?
Y
N
Email Alert
N

25. COMPLIANCE POLICIES

26. Policy: Tag Checker
25
Has required
tag?
Has valid
value?
Y
N
Can auto-tag?
Y
N
Email Alert
Y
N
Fixed after x
hours?
Pass
Pass
Y
Action:
Terminate
N

27. Policy: Disallowed Region
26
Allowed
region?
N
Alert with
Approval
Y
Pass
Action: Tag
as allowed
Y
Action:
Terminate
Approved?
N

28. DEMO

29. Contact sales@rightscale.com for more info
Q&A
28